All the Seconds
by NaruChloe
Summary: Ryan Atwood knows that life isn't made up of years or days or hours or minutes. It's made up of all those little seconds that can change your life in the blink of an eye [Slight RyanSeth Slash]


Title: All the Seconds Author: Naru Rating: PG-13 Summary: Fate isn't made up of hours or years or months or days. it's made up of all those little seconds that change your life in the blink of an eye. Ryth [Slight Slash] Disclaimer: Blah blah blah. I don't own them. blah blah... wish I did cuz theyre so hot.. Blah blah blah. suing me wont solve any of your problems Feedback: Pleeeease be a dear and gimme some feedback. its my first fic and I'm absolutely desperate to know how the public (that's you) respond to my story. Flame, praise, meh's, whatever I don't care as long as YOU care enough to lemme know how I did. That being said. please don't think I'm an utterly pathetic loser. enjoy the show floks.  
  
All the Seconds  
  
When most people reminisce about their lives, they tend to think in terms in days or hours or years, whatever.  
  
Like, for example, when Sandy Cohen decides thinks back about his youth, he always, always comes back to his 22nd year because that's when he met Kirsten. That's when he fell in love, when he became complete. He will never forget that year, even when he's old and senile and lying on his death bed. Because for Sandy Cohen, his 22nd year was the closest he ever got to feeling like everything in the world was perfect.  
  
And when Seth Cohen gets to be his father's age, he'll look back and remember the lazy days he spent with Ryan in Newport, whether it was playing Playstation or skateboarding on the boardwalk or even getting his ass kicked by the water polo team. For Seth, those summer days that he spent with Ryan Atwood when he was 17 will forever be his favorites. Because those were the days when he finally learned to more or less embrace the fact that he was a geek. Those were the days when he learned to embrace who he was without feeling inadequate or guilty or insuperior.  
  
And for Marissa Cooper, Newport's answer to Paris Hilton, her memories will never return to the endless hours that were spent partying away her youth. Because she would much rather forget all those times in which she was forced to don the mask of her party girl alter-ego "Coop." Those are times that she finds herself ashamed of, those are times that she wishes she could just leave behind. Instead, she'll think back to the hours she had spent with Ryan Atwood and Seth Cohen in that abandoned model home, because in those hours she had finally been allowed to be just. Marissa. Like her or leave her. There were no games, no bullshit. For once, it was what you see is what you get and screw you if you have a problem with it. For once, she didn't have to wear that false, perpetual smile. Not for Luke, not for Summer, not for her mother. Not for anyone.  
  
But when Ryan thinks back, he doesn't think about the happiest year of his life, or those lazy days or those fleeting hours. No, when Ryan thinks back, all he can see are seconds. You know, those little seconds in which his whole life was rearranged and there is nothing in the world that he could possibly do about it. Those seconds in which his life was completely and totally out of his hands, making him feel as if somebody had pulled the rug right out from underneath him. Because, no matter what people may say, the most important events in your life aren't things that happened over time, they aren't things that have been years in the making. No, they're the things that happened in a single, solitary instant. In the blink of a fucking eye. It's the most vulnerable and frustrating thing a person can experience.  
  
Ryan looks back and all he can see is those irreversible moments in time when it felt as if the whole world had stopped right there, and all he can do is sit and watch, helpless and vulnerable as he replays those moments over and over again in his mind, driving himself crazy at the knowledge that there's nothing he can possibly do about them now. But then again, there was nothing he could've done about them back when they were happening either.  
  
That moment as the car's window was shattered, glass falling to the ground like rain around his brother's feet. The silent police car passing by the almost empty alley and spotting the two young boys surrounding the abandoned car. The sickening sound of crashing metal as the stolen car slammed into something, Ryan couldn't remember what, and that heartbreaking look of defeat in his brother's eyes that managed to scare him even worse than the knowledge that they had both been caught in the act of commiting a major felony.  
  
That cold, uncomfortable, intrusive feel of metal digging into his wrists.  
  
Sandy Cohen giving him his business card, although at the time Ryan thought nothing of it, not knowing that that one business card held the key to the rest of his life. The hurt and confusion and overwhelming failure he had felt when he realized that his mother, the one woman who was supposed to love you unconditionally come hell or high water, had decided that she never wanted to see him again. That she would rather kick out her 17 year old son then her sleazy, free-loader pot head boyfriend. That unworthy feeling he got when he first saw the Cohen house and realized how big of a risk they were taking by letting this Chino thug into their perfect little Orange County bubble. He got that same unworthy feeling many times throughout his time in Newport.  
  
That second when he crawled under the sheets in the luxurious pool house when all of his worries left him, even if just for that fleeting second.  
  
The first time he saw Seth Cohen, sitting on the floor with his beloved Playstation. Seth asking him if he wanted to play, an outstretched arm offering the other controller. It was then that Ryan realized that this boy, this kid who knew absolutely nothing about him except that his mother had didn't want him because he had gotten arrested, was accepting him into his life. What Ryan hadn't realized was that this awkward teenage boy would be the most important person Ryan would ever meet.  
  
When Marissa Cooper gave him that beautiful beyond words smile at the Fashion Show and for some reason, Ryan couldn't manage to feel anything but flattered at her attempt to create some sort of chemistry between them. The look of betrayal and confusion on Seth's face as he watched the woman whom he thought was the girl of his dreams try to remove Ryan's jacket.  
  
The moment that Seth surround Ryan in a hug, when he experienced that overwhelming feeling of warmth within him that the undeniably beautiful Marissa Cooper had failed to create when she smiled at him during the Charity Fashion Show.  
  
The moment when he stepped over the threshold of his crappy Chino house, and realized that everything that had made that house his home, from his mother to his bed, was gone.  
  
The look of utter happiness and shock on Seth's face when he saw that Ryan had returned and the knowledge that maybe there were people in this world who actually cared about a brooding "thug" from the wrong side of the tracks. Running into Seth as he tried to make his stealthy getaway before he had to be sent to a group home, when Seth expressed his desire to follow Ryan to wherever it is he was heading, the knowledge that this awkward teenage boy would most likely follow Ryan through hell and high waters just as long as he was allowed to bring his skateboard along for the ride. The moment when Marissa had caught on to Ryan and Seth's secret plan, demolishing all hopes either of the boys had had of a exclusive weekend for just the two of them.  
  
The hurt in Marissa's eyes she watched her father receive a lone from Kirsten. It was in that moment that Ryan Atwood realized that no one is perfect no mater what people may tell you. That everybody fucks up whether your rich or poor, from Orange County or from Chino.  
  
That moment when he and Seth and Marissa were riding down the pier together when Seth gave Ryan the most wonderful, most genuine smile he had ever seen, and for that fleeting moment Ryan and Seth were the only people in the entire universe.  
  
Marissa's angelic face perfectly illuminated by the flickering candlelight as she begged and pleaded for Ryan to let her stay for just that one last night, and the disappointment and confusion he felt when he realized that if it had instead been Seth standing there in front of him, begging for acceptance, he never would've been able to deny him.  
  
Luke's speeding fist connecting with Ryan's jaw and the gut wrenching dread he felt in the pit of his stomach when he fell to the ground and realized he had knocked over one of those candles. The moment he realized that Kirsten's house, her beautiful million dollar model home, was about to go up in flames. The moment he realized that he could very well die in Kirsten's beautiful million dollar model home. The realization that if he did indeed die, that he would never see Seth again, that he would never get to kiss him, never get to tell him.  
  
But Ryan's train of thought is suddenly derailed because Seth, who has been restlessly shifting in his sleep all night long, is suddenly pressing his soft lips against Ryan's warm forehead. "Go to sleep Atwood," he mumbles, only half-awake, and then he mumbles one last time before he nuzzles back into Ryan's warm embrace and quickly falls asleep.  
  
"I love you, Ryan Atwood."  
  
And that's when a small smile creeps across Ryan's face because that's when he understands it all. Understands that all of those seconds, all of those irreversible, unchangeable, life-altering seconds, played some role in getting him to the very place he is right. That if just one of those seconds had played out any differently, he might never have ended up here in Seth Cohen's warm embrace. He might never have ended up with the love of his life. He might never have ended up happy.  
  
He's not going to start trying to understand why it is that the earth works in such a weirdly frustrating way, but all he can think is that God or whoever it may be up there, sure as hell has a twisted sense of justice. Not that all of the suffering and the angst wasn't worth it, but right now is definitely neither the time nor place for those ponderings.  
  
Ryan presses a warm kiss on Seth's nose and Seth lets out a happy little sigh of contentment as he does so.  
  
"I love you, Seth Cohen," he whispers as he slowly drifts away to sleep.  
  
Besides, no one ever got anywhere by dwelling on the past or by counting all the seconds.  
  
Fini 


End file.
